Upbit Suffers Major Solana Wallet Breach, Vows to Cover All Losses

The crypto industry keeps pushing forward with fresh ideas, but its growth is still challenged by ongoing security risks. That concern surfaced again on Thursday when Upbit, South Korea’s largest crypto exchange, reported a major breach in its Solana network wallet, in which millions of dollars were moved to an external wallet without authorization.

Scale and Source of the Breach

Upbit explained in a revised notice that the withdrawal, first estimated at 54 billion won, or about $37 million, was later confirmed as 44.5 billion won, roughly $30.5 million. The adjustment was made after reviewing the value of the assets at the moment the transfer occurred.

The exchange said the breach occurred in one of its hot wallets, while its cold wallet remained secure. The irregular activity was detected at 4:42 a.m. KST, marking Upbit’s second major security incident since the 2019 Ethereum theft of about $50 million. After noticing the unusual movement of funds, the exchange immediately paused deposits and withdrawals and launched a full review to assess the total scale of the outflow.

Upbit Moves to Secure Funds and Restore Safety

To protect user assets, Upbit has taken several immediate measures:

• The exchange pledged to cover the full amount of the stolen funds from its own resources so that customers would not suffer any losses.
• All remaining assets were moved into cold storage to prevent further outflows and enhance overall security.
• On-chain freezing measures were launched, and the company is working with projects and authorities to restrict affected tokens, with about 2.3 billion won of Solaire already frozen while other assets are being tracked for additional freezes.
• A complete security review of deposit and withdrawal systems is underway, and services will be restored gradually once safety is confirmed.

Oh Kyung-seok, CEO of Dunamu, the parent company of Upbit, apologized for the inconvenience and assured users that their assets would not be affected, noting that the breach involved multiple tokens within the Solana ecosystem, including Solana, Jupiter, Solaire, Magic Eden, Official Trump, USDC, and others.

Crypto Activity Shifts Amid Upbit Breach and Dunamu Deal

Following the breach and the pause in withdrawals, Ki Young Ju, founder and CEO of CryptoQuant, observed that some traders were buying alternative tokens while arbitrage bots remained inactive, taking advantage of the temporary market pause.

Meanwhile, Naver Financial, the financial arm of Naver, agreed to acquire Dunamu in an all-stock deal valued at 15.13 trillion won, or roughly $10.27 billion. The company described the acquisition as a move to strengthen its presence in digital assets and support long-term growth.